Style

Art fairs are all the rage these days, as they combine massive amounts of culture and massive amounts of capital in a proximal and immediate manner that befits our exposure-obsessed, choice-is-all, click-and-buy Internet age. They also often act as a tentpole for other events—fashion shows, parties, concerts, panel discussions—that draw the CB/CB (cropped blazer/colorful bucks) crowd.

All of this—tentpoles included—was on display at the first Frieze Art Fair, New York, an offshoot of the devastatingly trendy British bazaar, which took place the other week on Randall’s Island, one of the few locations in New York that makes the artisanal and inaccessible Brooklyn neighborhood of Red Hook seem convenient.

As implied by the name, Randall’s Island is surrounded by water on all sides. And though it was formerly home to such titillating institutions as an orphanage, a poor house, a homeopathic hospital, a recuperative facility for Civil War vets, a school for juvenile vagrants, and a psychiatric ward gracelessly known as an “idiot asylum,” it now serves mainly as a stanchion base for the Robert F. Kennedy (né Triborough) Bridge, but in recent years, bits of it have been rehabilitated with sporting fields, overpriced concession stands, and even a music venue. It is not served by the subway—not even by the G train—and its nautical location between Hell Gate and Bronx Kill, while graphic and expressive, is of no help to cabbies.

Fortunately, BMW acted as the fair’s vehicular sponsor, and extended to us its ultimate driving patronage. Not content to leave us shuttle-worthy V.I.P.’s to the vagaries of a chauffeur’s often questionable radio taste, and following from the general art-fair practice of commissioning site-specific works, the Bavarians invited a trio of artists to create audio installations that would play through the exquisite sound system in their 35, Frieze-liveried, long-wheelbase 7-Series sedans. (You can download all three files here.)

Traffic being what it is, we had the opportunity to listen to the full hour of artistic audio offerings more than once during our journey to and from the fair. While we love the idea of sound installations—our young minds were blown by a visit to the Dream House in the early 90s—we were a bit disappointed that the three pieces steadfastly refused to abide the conventions of the genre: none was particularly immersive, and only one of them—Martin Creed’s “Where You Go”—was properly concise. The other two—Rick Moody’s “The Undependable Global Positioning System” and a piece by Frances Stark—were too long and too muddled, respectively.

Luckily for us, among the 180 dealer stands and 1,000 artists spread out over the fair’s half-mile-long tent were an enchanting mélange of vehicular-themed car-art (cArt!) pieces. Click through the slide show below to view our five favorites.

Jeff Wall, Men Move an Engine Block, 2008: You can’t get much more straightforward than the title of this photo. A special Stick Shift cArt prize will go to anyone who can correctly identify this engine.

Photo: Photograph by Brett Berk.

Andreas Schulze, Rombo Duemilia, 1998: A yellow sports car that looks as though it were designed by Bertone during the firm’s angular, 1970s concept-car heyday.

Photograph by Brett Berk.

Asta Gröting, Mein Smart, 2012: A polyurethane cast of the underside of the artist’s Smart car succeeds in making the invisible, visible.

Photograph by Brett Berk.

Liz Cohen, Trabantamino, 2002–10: This hydraulically powered, extendible, low-rider version of the universally derided Eastern European Trabant was a real show-stopper.

Jeff Wall, Men Move an Engine Block, 2008: You can’t get much more straightforward than the title of this photo. A special Stick Shift cArt prize will go to anyone who can correctly identify this engine.